Down Nearly 60% From Its Peak, Is It Finally Time to Buy Joby Aviation?

Joby Aviation has fallen from a record $20.39 share price to below $9, roughly a 60% decline, as investors worry about two unresolved regulatory hurdles: FAA Type Certification and the timing of first commercial flights in Dubai. The company remains deeply unprofitable and trades at about 18x estimated 2028 sales, versus Archer at 8x, even as analysts still project revenue growth from $53 million in 2025 to $459 million in 2028. The article is cautious on the stock, saying Joby may be worth nibbling on but not a larger position until certification and launch visibility improves.

Analysis

The market is treating JOBY less like a growth equity and more like a binary regulatory option, which is why the drawdown can overshoot fundamentals so quickly. The key second-order effect is that every month of certification slippage doesn’t just defer revenue; it forces a reset in financing assumptions, widening the spread between “best-in-breed” and “capital-intensive pre-revenue” in the eVTOL group. That dynamic also benefits incumbents with real near-term airline distribution, because they can keep optionality on urban mobility without needing the market to underwrite execution risk today.

The overlooked risk is dilution compounding with time. If certification slips into 2027, JOBY likely has to fund another full operating cycle before meaningful commercial cash flow, which makes the current equity value sensitive to both share count growth and the discount rate applied to distant revenue. In a higher-for-longer rate regime, that combination is more damaging than the article implies; the stock is effectively long time-to-market and short liquidity runway.

On the other hand, the move may be partially overdone if investors are already pricing in a meaningful delay versus management’s public schedule. The better read is that the stock should trade on catalyst probability, not addressable-market rhetoric: upside comes from proof points on FAA timing and first commercialization, not TAM slides. If those catalysts land on time, the stock can re-rate sharply because the float is already conditioned for disappointment; if they slip, downside remains asymmetric because valuation support is weak relative to sales that are still years out.

Key Decisions for Investors

• Avoid initiating a standalone long in JOBY ahead of certification visibility; the risk/reward is poor until FAA timing is narrower than a 2-3 quarter window.
• For speculative exposure, use a small call spread in JOBY only after a concrete certification milestone or Dubai launch confirmation; this caps capital at risk while preserving upside to a sharp re-rating.
• Pair trade: long UBER / short JOBY for the next 6-12 months to express the view that distribution partners monetize mobility optionality sooner than the OEMs themselves.
• Relative value: long DAL vs. long JOBY exposure if the thesis is premium airport transfer adoption; DAL has nearer-term monetization and less binary regulatory risk.
• If insisting on eVTOL beta, prefer ACHR over JOBY for relative value only when the goal is lower multiple exposure; both are risky, but JOBY still deserves the premium only after execution de-risks.